


living so brash and unforgiving

by traiteuse (merriell)



Series: saccharine / disinterest [3]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Dissociation, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, and more to be added later - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-16
Packaged: 2020-06-28 02:57:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19803286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriell/pseuds/traiteuse
Summary: Steve tries to make sense all that had been going on for the past week with the help of someone unexpected.He also knows he's losing grip of reality, but that's another matter entirely.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Hippo Campus' Bambi (which is very Steve Harrington and not only because of the title). 
> 
> While watching Season 2 and Season 3, I've been wondering how does Steve even handle all of this? It's not like he has any friends that could help him, then of course, I realize, it's by dissociating. He's always spacing out, anyway. Simple really.
> 
> Can you tell how much I love it when characters hide information from each other and that affects how they look at each other? Prepare for more confusion. I love it, it's like - when it gets revealed, how the car crash is happening, and you're just waiting for the brick to land.
> 
> Also, don't you love when character gets too much into a feeling and misunderstands something instead of talking?
> 
> this is titled: _dreams make everything easier, and everyone braver_ on the drafts.

The dial tone rings endlessly.

It _seems_ to, at least. Steve is staring at the family picture again, his twelve-year-old figure smiling thinly at the camera, the black tuxedo wrong and heavy around him. He was standing in the middle of his parents, his mother with her arm around him, her red lipstick perfect and muted, forming a small smile, and his father, with his broad chest, staring back at the camera with a stern stillness of his mouth. He remembers that day in pieces, not by its importance but the lie his mother had told him.

_We’ll go to Disneyland this summer, okay, Stevie? I’m sorry for not spending Christmas at home._

He’d spent the entire summer waiting for his mother to come back from one of her social functions in the city before giving up entirely, ended up spending his summer with the nanny his parents had hired to take care of him for the summer while they were away. He cried silently to his pillow at night until his eyes were swollen and told Tommy the reason why when they met in the morning.

Tommy had said, _are you seriously that much of a prick to be crying over that?_

_It wasn’t about the Disneyland thing, it was about—_

_Jesus, you’re so ungrateful._

Before they left, two months ago, his father had left a number in a small, yellow Post-It stuck above the number panel on his phone. They said that they were going to be away for a month, left him the amount of money that could last for six months for a three-persons family like Byers.

He had said from the porch while he watched them leave, _you call us if you need us, okay, son? We’ll pick up._

The phone rings for five more times before it dies.

Steve grabs the family picture too hard until it falls, sending glass shards everywhere.

Driving to school, Steve wonders if he’s going crazy. All around him, people are living their lives as usual, greeting each other in small-town fashion, while the events of last weekend plays like a broken record in his head. The only evidence of it happening was the bruise on his arm, bright purple against his pale skin. He had the sick feeling of storming into Hawkins Middle to find The Party, force them to recount the event to his face just to make him _sure_ it wasn’t a dream.

He didn’t dream at all since that, which makes it worse, makes him feel like everything that happened is a dream. The grip on the steering wheel tightens as he speeds, doesn’t even notice as he drives through a stop sign. When he pulls up to school, the parking lot is still empty save for old, dinged up cars that he knows belong to teachers.

He presses up his forehead against the steering wheel. The leather is cool against his skin.

Then, he remembers, _Nancy_. He’s supposed to pick her up, as always, but after what had happened, he’s not quite sure he should or shouldn’t. They _haven’t_ broken up, yet, right? Or have they? He’s pretty sure he’s scared her, getting angry with the bat in his hand, like that...

He doesn’t know how long he’s sitting inside his car until somebody knocks at his window. He looks up to see brown curls and blue eyes and almost feels his heart leaping out of his chest.

“Nancy,” he mutters after rolling down his window.

“Steve,” she says. “Are you... okay?”

“I’m,” he stops for a bit, looking around at his surrounding—cars had already filled up the previously empty lot, making him wonder if he was dissociating enough not to notice the passing of time. “I’m fine. Look, can we talk? I’m sorry for last weekend, but I was _worried_ , and no one knew where you are and then I found you with the gun and Jonathan and I—“

“ _Steve,_ breathe, please,” she closes her eyes for a second before staring at him. “If we talk now, we’ll both be late. How about we meet at the diner after school and we’ll talk about this?”

She’s waiting for him to answer, but the bell to the first period start ringing, disturbing their daze. Her eyes dart from the entrance to him, still waiting. When he doesn’t, she removes her hand from the car.

“Just tell me it’s real,” he says suddenly.

The words seem to struck Nancy. She looks at him with raised brow, a scowl edging on her lips. “What do you mean?”

“What happened,” he answers with a faint voice, “tell me it isn’t a dream.”

She bites her lower lip, like she wants to say something else, but decides not to. “It wasn’t a dream, Steve. It really happened.”

He wishes that was enough to calm him, but it doesn’t. “Okay. Thanks,” he replies, rolling up the window quickly before she can say anything else.

As Nancy makes her way to the entrance, he turns his car back on and reverses out of the parking lot. He doesn’t see her glance back at him, doesn’t see the owner of the blue Camaro where he’s leaning against his car, watching the entire exchange with his cigarette burning, cherry-red, between his lips.

He buys a pack of nails from the corner store and spends an hour trying to stab it in the end of his bat. Both of his hands are flaring red once he’s finished, a prick of blood dripping from his thumb, but he licks it with his tongue before he throws the bat to the back of his car and drives to the quarry.

The sun is a prickle against his hair and forehead when he arrives, looking down from the highest point, at the murky water, the way it doesn’t show what’s under it even under the sun. When he steps near the edge, a piece of stone breaks and falls below before disappearing completely from view. He looks down, his bat beside him, and he realizes he’s not scared of falling.

He doesn’t want to fall, yet, but he’s pretty sure that’s just human instinct.

“You’re going to put out and jump for real this time, Harrington?”

Startled by the sudden voice, he loses his balance for a little before he spins on the heel of his feet and steps away from the edge instead. The edge of Hargrove’s mouth is lifted into what must be a teasing quirk, his blond curls lightening under the harsh sun. The denim jacket he’s always wearing is missing from his body—only a red button down whose top buttons seem to always be missing.

“What the fuck is your problem?” Steve barks back, although his heart seems eerily calm for someone who was one inch away from falling. “Don’t startle someone like that, I could have fallen for real, Jesus!”

“Just me, I’m afraid,” the man standing across of him only scoffs. His eyes dart to the baseball bat on Steve’s hand. “That’s a pretty menacing weapon for someone who doesn’t believe there’s monster in the woods.”

“Why are you _here_? Don’t you have class?”

“Could ask the same question to you, _amigo_.”

“It’s no—“ he stops, realizing he doesn’t have any explanation why he’s standing at the quarry with a lethal weapon in his hand, looking down like he’s going to jump. “It’s none of your goddamn business, _amigo,_ ” he says weakly.

“I really don’t like it when people lie to me,” there’s that dangerous sparkle in his eyes again, the one that sends chill to Steve’s spine, sending him into _flight_ mode by pure instinct. “So, I’m going to ask you a question, pretty boy, and you’re going to answer me, truthfully, and maybe I’ll answer yours. Why are _you_ here?”

Steve’s mouth falls open to answer, to _lie_. There’s a harsh wind blowing from the woods, sending dry leaves to his direction, until he’s forced to step back just a little close to the edge. A nagging feeling climbs his throat, quietening the lie from his tongue. He can only stare at the man in front of him who waits and watches with a small smile, not exactly threatening him to tell the truth as much as daring him to tell a lie.

He remembers Nancy and Jonathan, pressed together; he remembers the kids: Max and El talking to each other in hushed voices, Mike patting Will’s head, telling him to calm down, Lucas and Dustin laughing with each other. The fact that _they_ have each other and he has no one, not even to talk to.

Except he doesn’t have to be alone.

Billy in the woods, hand on his cheek, all autumn air and cigarette smoke—

Wait. That’s _new_.

That’s not _real_.

He blinks away the image, brows furrowing, hearing the ringing in his head again, and he wants it badly to _stop_ again, to only hear the silence.

“I think there’s monsters in the woods,” Steve settles for that, at last. Doesn’t feel the need to lie to someone who already believed that there’s something in the woods. In fact, he’s probably putting Hargrove in danger if he doesn’t say the truth, with the way Billy’s already stumbling and searching for the monsters, _alone_ , just his fists against the world.

Not that he looks at Billy Hargrove and thinks _prey_.

Hargrove grins, all-teeth. He swipes his tongue on his teeth, and says, “Finally, some _truth_ around here.”

They’re in the junkyard, the edge of the forest, and Steve thinks that it’s so strange to be in there by himself, let alone with Hargrove. He’s leaning on the rusting bus as the rubber soles of boots hit the metal on the top. Hargrove’s been looking at the claw marks at the steel, one of the only traces left of the creature that had cornered them inside.

On their walk to the junkyard, Steve told Hargrove the gist of the story: leaving out things that are still secret, like his conversation with El and of course the fact that he was the one who created those things at the first place. Hargrove had listened silently while smoking, his expression calm as he stared far away. He _seemed_ like he believed it, even after Steve told him that the corpse disappeared when he came back to the junkyard to pick it up.

“That’s no mountain lion, alright,” he remarks as he jumps off the roof to the ground, all _show_ , sending dust everywhere. Even with the nagging anxiety that’s still corrupting his chest and turning him into a ball of irritability, Steve can’t help but to chuckle seeing the display.

“Max said the same thing as you, believe it or not.”

“Right. Did she scream when she saw it?”

“She did, but only because it startled her, I think,” unconsciously, Steve scratches the tip of his nose, stifling another chuckle that’s begging to be let out of his mouth, mostly at how ridiculous this whole situation is.

Hargrove leans on the empty space beside him, their shoulders touching together. The shade prevents the metal from heating up, but Steve flinches, slightly, out of surprise rather than anything else. He leans again after that, feeling the warmth radiating from Billy’s shoulder. If the other notices, he doesn’t say anything. The silence settles around them, comfortably, like it had been there before, and Steve’s thought flies to the night they spent at the quarry, just the two of them, laughing under the hood of Hargrove’s Camaro.

He remembers that in moments. Every time he tries to piece it together into a long film in his head, he fails; fails connecting the harsh smile on Hargrove’s mouth with the gentle shake of his head when Steve said something dumb or irresponsibly wrong about history or movies or _something_. He’s half glad that he doesn’t recall what he actually said.

“You sure it was dead when you left it?”

He doesn’t realize he’s staring at Hargrove until the blue eyes were on him. Flustered, he looks away. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure El and I whacked it too many times even after it stopped moving, but it’s not like we checked if it’s still breathing or anything.” He looks at the bat beside his feet, weighing how effective it is now with the nails sticking out of it.

“Doesn’t that mean somebody moved it?”

“Who would move it? No one knew the body was there. The kids were with us when we are at Byers after that, and I make sure to drop Max and Dustin quickly so I can go back there. I don’t think Nancy and Jonathan picked it up either...”

He stops. _Nancy_.

The sun is slowly disappearing from the top of their heads, and he pushes off his body from the bus as he looks around. The walk to the junkyard had been long—they left their car at a clearing near the quarry, mostly because the trees were too dense to drive here—and it’ll take at least half an hour to walk back there.

“I have to go. I have to meet Nancy. I said I will meet her...” he says. He stares at the small frown on Hargrove’s lips. “Uh. Thank you for, uh... listening? And believing. And accompanying me here.”

He expects a scowl, a curse, an insult, a jab on his clinginess to Nancy, _anything_ that fits the Hargrove he knows, the one who shoves him to the waxed floor of basketball court, the one who takes a bite out of his _money_ , like everybody did. But Hargrove only sends him a look, all amusement, before he smiles.

Steve doesn’t even know that Hargrove can smile like that. He always smiles all teeth, all _threats_ , like he’s trying to scare people not to get closer. To stay away, before they get the brunt of his pure strength. _This_ smile is soft and easy, almost gentle, almost inviting.

It’s fucking strange.

“Don’t go soft on me, Harrington. I’m here because you said there are monsters in this boring fuck of a town. Not because I want to accompany _you_.”

Okay, never mind, there he is. Steve almost smiles in relief.

Give it to Billy fucking Hargrove to be the only _sure_ thing in his life.

Jonathan is there when he settles on the booth. He’s sitting across of Nancy, looking up at him under that floppy mess of his hair, but doesn’t say anything as Steve assumes his position next to her. If they smell the scent of cigarette on his hair, they don’t say anything.

“Where did you go?” Nancy’s the one who breaks the silence first, her fingers fiddling with the straw of her chocolate milkshake. Jonathan’s drinking coffee. “You’re late, you know.”

Steve jaw tightens. He knows he’s late. He stopped his car at the arcade, passing the diner entirely, after he saw Jonathan’s car on the parking lot, claw marks and all, and contemplates not coming at all. “I was,” he presses his lips together, trying to invent an answer that’s not _that_. That’s not the fact that he was quite enjoying the easy silence that came with being with Billy Hargrove more than the claustrophobia of sitting with an elephant in the room when he’s with Nancy and Jonathan. “I fell asleep on the car. Sorry.”

A silence passes over them as Nancy watches him pointedly and Jonathan’s gaze darts between the view outside to her. He’s trying not to let his body language tell that he’s lying, so he slumps his body on the table, leaning half of his weight on it, and runs his finger over the surface of a mustard bottle.

“We’re trying to figure out where the monsters are,” Jonathan tries after no one speaks. “And where it went. There’s another one that’s still alive? We’re trying to see if we can find it.”

“The creatures are dangerous, Steve, if we let it run lose, it can hurt someone, and we don’t want that. We can’t have everyone knowing it just yet. People will just think we’re crazy.”

“Will’s castle is around there, too, it’s dangerous...”

“And the junkyard, that’s the place where everyone plays, so...”

God, he doesn’t know why he decided to walk in even after seeing Jonathan out there. He should’ve known. He thought that it was only going to be him and Nancy, trying to make sense what they are after he finds her with _Byers_ , after she lied about him to him—and everyone—after he saw what her eyes look like, the distrust in it, where he’s been doing nothing but sitting there and _taking_ it without so much as protest. He thought, well, the baseball bat’s probably _why_ she was afraid, but still, does he look like someone who would do that?

Yet, here they are, and both of them are thinking about the creatures, and Steve’s the only one who’s thinking about himself. He can practically hear his parents and Tommy in his ears, egging him about how selfish he is.

“Look,” he says, finally, “I don’t know what you two want of me. I don’t want to help you two chase monsters in the woods. I have enough on my plate as it is. I came here because I want to talk to Nancy... not talk about chasing monsters, or trying to find the corpse so you can break the story... or whatever the fuck you two do now.”

They remained silent hearing that, but he can taste it in their eyes, taste it from the tenseness of Jonathan’s mouth as he glances at Nancy, the _I told you so_ , the way Nancy is glaring at him, in disbelief, but also not surprised.

_Steve Harrington, always so selfish._

_Why would King Steve want to help anyone?_

He just wants people to stop lying to him.

Sometimes he thinks that’s far too much to ask.

“You’re getting _lost_ in the woods just fine, the two of you,” he says, softly. It sounds loud enough, hammering on Nancy’s face until she leans back, away from him.

“We were really lost, you know,” she says, her voice raising. Her hands tremble in anger and Steve knows he fucked up. “I have no idea what you’re implying, Steve, but nothing happened between us.”

Steve wants very much to believe in that. But she already lied once, how the _fuck_ is he supposed to blindly trust her?

“Yeah,” he says, weakly. He gets up from the booth and glances at Jonathan, who looks like he’s rather be anywhere else but here. “Yeah, right.”

He picks up the fallen over frame from beside his phone and stares at it for a moment before putting it, face down, beside the phone. It’s been hours since the diner and he’s still thinking of driving back and saying sorry to Nancy, begging them to let them inside their plan, but every single time, he turns to his unlocked entrance door and feels himself pausing.

Instead, he heats up the last of microwave dinner that’s in the freezer and eats as his eyes stare unfocusedly at the action movie that’s playing on the screen. He imagines Nancy and Jonathan, in the woods, afraid, with his jacket around her shoulder, huddled up for warmth. Something slips between his ribs, quietly, like a knife he doesn’t see.

He’s stabbing one of the hard carrots when an image of Hargrove in the woods pop behind his mind. The blond curls pale under the moonlight. The burning end of his cigarette lighting up his face orange in the middle of the cool light. A chuckle around his words when he says, _Wake up, Harrington_.

Again, he knows that that’s not real.

But it’s not like he’s big on differentiating between reality and dream these days.

The glass shards from the fallen over frame is still scattered around the table where his phone lays. He’s waiting for it to ring. He’s waiting for his father to return the numerous calls he’s given him that morning. He’s waiting for the anger in his voice when he asks Steve where he’d been to be skipping class that day.

The phone stays in its place, not making any sound. The only sound that he can hear is the voice from the television, gunshots that ring in the quiet. Steve wonders, if he walks there with his bare feet, stepping over the shards until it stabs into his skin, whether it will hurt or not. He wishes it will not hurt.

He wishes this is just a dream.

Maybe, if this is a dream, Nancy’s going to be there the next morning, in front of her locker with a smile, her arm will circle around his neck as he laughs, lifting her up slightly.

Maybe, if this is a dream, his mother is going to be in his bedroom door, saying, _hey, Stevie, ready to go to Disneyland?_

 _I know when I’m dreaming and when I’m not,_ he remembers Hargrove saying, and he can almost taste his cigarette in the air.

He wishes it comes that easy for him.

He dreams.

Except he thinks he does, because he’s suddenly in the woods, and the last thing he remembers is falling asleep on the couch after he throws away his dinner into the trash. He’s sitting on the ground with his khaki. A light rain has just start falling from the sky. It’s not even night, like it always is—the sun has just setting in the dream, painting the sky an orange-purple color that feels a little too real.

Beside him, he feels someone sits beside him. They both watch the sky silently for a while. Steve doesn’t have the urge to turn, to check who it is. It feels comfortable and grounding, he feels like he can stay there forever, just sitting, forgetting the real world.

“You can’t think that,” the person beside him talks. It sounds like someone he knows, sounds like somebody he trusts, and for one second Steve is attacked by the realization that they can read his mind, and it’s morbid, the feeling of being known by another person. “They might just decide to keep you here forever if you even have the slightest desire to do so.”

He suddenly smells it: the cigarette smoke, the autumn air, and he thinks of a name that’s whispered somewhere around his chest, but doesn’t say it. He turns and see him, blond curls at all, soft under the light of dusk, and he thinks that it’s definitely not real. Although he’s been interacting with Billy for a bit this past week, this is the first time that Billy feels completely unguarded, like a figment of Steve’s imagination, a _rock_ before everything goes to shit, before there’s monsters chasing people in the woods.

Which is stupid, because Billy’s the first one to tell him that he knows—or at least have a vague idea—that there’s monsters in the woods. He’s not a rock. He’s a wolf in the woods, someone who knows Steve’s secrets before anybody else does.

And yet, he doesn’t feel threatened nor afraid.

It’s like he’s just been _there_ the entire time.

Hence: it’s not Billy. It’s just a creature out of his dream, and this time, somehow, it’s in the form of Billy fucking Hargrove.

“Who will?” he asks. Not sure he wants to know, but it’s out of his mouth before he realizes.

“The woods.”

“Oh,” he says, understanding, as if it makes sense.

They’re fallen into one of those silence that gives around them, like the one in the junkyard, where Billy’s shoulder feels warm against his, where he wanted to stay for a little bit longer but _ruined_ it. He imagines staying back there, just the silence and smoke from Billy’s cigarette between them. How he probably won’t ruin his relationship with Nancy even further if he had just stayed there.

“Stop that,” Billy mutters. It’s soft, but against the quiet of the woods, it feels like screaming. Droplets of rain trickles down from his eyelashes to his cheek.

“Stop what?”

“Thinking about Nancy fucking Wheeler.”

“I should find it creepy that you’re rummaging around my mind like it’s yours.”

“It’s not that I want to. It’s just the way it is, pretty boy,” Billy slurs. He offers Steve the pack of cigarette he’s been holding in his hand. Steve takes it, and watches as another stick fills it place. “Dream logic and all. Magic’s not supposed to make sense.”

“Well, you know what, _fuck_ magic,” Steve’s hand on himself, searching for his lighter as he traps the cigarette between his lips. Before he can find it, Billy’s hand on his wrist, while the other is near his cigarette. Steve watches as the tip of Billy’s pointer finger lights up with a green fire, sending green embers flying into the air before he lights up the end of Steve’s cigarette. The fire keeps burning even as rain falls on it, and only disappears when Billy clicks his finger. When he pulls away from Steve’s orbit, his hand remains around Steve’s wrist.

Steve can’t help but to stare at Billy’s face. How the long curls fall near his eyes, half-lidded blue eyes staring at him intensely until he feels naked under it. Billy’s beautiful, the kind of beauty that looks like a marble statue from one of his father’s art books. A smile edges on Billy’s lips as he thinks that, and Steve has to remind himself that the creature can read his mind.

Not that it matters. He’s not _real_.

“You know what?” Billy’s voice is a growl, low, against the silence, and he smiles, all teeth, and Steve is reminded how it feels, how the smile almost feel predatory, like he can eat Steve whole. “I might want to keep you here forever if you keep that up.”

His mind flies to Nancy’s gaze on him, the poison Mike has towards him, the abomination of his creature that’s just running freely in the woods, the empty house, the _lies_ , the loneliness that’s always hang heavily in the air. It contrasts easily against the comfortable warmth in here, like summer’s coming even as rain falls, like he doesn’t need to be there in his house, alone, fighting his nightmares with only a baseball bat on his hand.

He wants to say something; it gets stuck on his throat.

He has to remind himself this is a dream.

Billy pulls him closer, close enough for Steve to be able to smell the cheap cologne on his neck, his lips warm and far too _real_ against Steve’s ear, and whispers, “Are you really dreaming _this_ , though, _Greywaren_?”

Steve wakes up.

The phone, across the room, rings loudly against the silence of his house. His hand instinctively darts to his ear, where Billy had whispered the words against, and he can almost feel the warmth of Billy’s breath against his skin, the words still racking in his brain, over and over.

It feels real.

It feels _too_ real.

The phone keeps ringing.

He shivers, and pretends not to notice the tightness in his briefs.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bonding over daddy issues and magic is my favorite past time.
> 
> A dialogue from this that's repeated is lifted shamelessly from The Dream Thieves. You can find it [here](https://sarahbatistapereira.tumblr.com/post/68015536271/never-going-to-be-you-ronankavinsky-and). TRC has its share of faults, but it's really one of my favorite exchanges that I've read, ever. The tension is lovely. FYI, there's a Camaro and a BMW in TRC, too, which is the whole reason why I had the idea for this fic at the first place, lol.

Will Byers is missing.

Steve can still hear the call that Dustin given him that morning. He stepped over shards of glass as Dustin started rambling about how they’ve been near the quarry, searching for the last monster without no one accompanying them besides that girl El, _for some reasons_ , when Mike started arguing with Will about something. Will ran off after the argument and when they couldn’t find him, they all thought he just _went home_ , until Joyce Byers gave Mike the fright of his life by asking if Will had stayed over for the night the next morning.

Steve had asked, his mind still filled with the warmth of that lips against his ear, “Have you really checked with the Byers?”

“Son of a bitch, Steve, have you been fucking _listening_?”

“Calm the fuck down, Dustin, this is too fucking early for a middle-schooler to be cursing at me.”

It’s four days after and they still can’t find him. Chief Hopper even started the search parties to scourge the woods yesterday, but Will is still nowhere to be found.

Steve opens his locker door during recess, hand fumbling with an aspirin that he needs to chase away the ache in his head, when he sees Jonathan sticking posters at the bulletin board with a sad look in his face. He recalls their conversation at the diner and feels so guilty that he can only stare.

He’s dry-swallowing the aspirin when Nancy approaches Jonathan, starts talking at him in hushed voices. When they saw his stare, their face sour before they look away.

Steve really fucked up, he knows.

“Jesus, look at how pathetic he is,” he hears Tommy’s voice on his side before he sees his friend. Steve doesn’t need to spare him a glance to know that Carol’s beside Tommy, with her hand circled around his waist. “Can’t believe Princess Nancy’s already running off with the freak. How is it that I don’t even know you two broke up?”

“Have some fucking sympathy, Tommy, the kid could be dead or something.”

“Yeah, have some fucking sympathy,” Steve agrees without thinking before he turns to notice that Tommy hasn’t been standing with _Carol_. Hargrove has his arms crossed in a dark glower as he watches Jonathan and Nancy from Tommy’s side. He’s wearing a shirt for once, his gold necklace contrast against the design of the black shirt.

When Hargrove notices Steve’s gaze on his face, he shoots him an easy, mocking smile. “Pretty shitty of her to be on Byers’ side so soon, though,” he adds with what Steve thinks is a mocking tone.

Steve looks away at once.

He had avoided Billy Hargrove since he started getting plagued by dreams of him in the forest. He knows that the Billy in the dream isn’t the same as the Hargrove in reality, but Steve can still feel his heart seizing as he sees him, as if Hargrove can also read his mind, as if he _knows_ for sure the little conversation they have in the dreams. So far, he’s been succeeding; he feigns an injury on his feet from glass shards to avoid basketball, and tries to sit far away from the blond during their shared classes. He’s gotten so good at it he doesn’t even _know_ that Tommy hangs out with Hargrove now.

But it isn’t like he’s avoiding the Billy in his dream. Not that he can. He’s always there now, smoking, a small comfort in cold nights, never as close as the first dream, because if he gets too close, Steve would always force himself to _wake up_ , either by hurting himself in the dream or _jumping_ off to the quarry.

By last night’s dream, it seems like Billy has gotten the message. He stayed far away and they spend most of the dream talking. When he’s there, Steve doesn’t bring anything back, and he’s _grateful_ for that, at least.

Not that the real Hargrove would know, of course.

“You going to the pep rally tonight?” Hargrove asks as Steve closes his locker door. He’s leaning against someone’s locker now, right beside Steve’s.

“I don’t know,” he answers distractedly.

“I mean _we_ know the kid’s dead if that one monster is still around, right?”

Steve swings to see whether Tommy has an ear to their conversation, but Carol has found her way to him, and now they’re kissing at the lockers across of his. There’s not much students around them, either, already making their way to classes or whatever they have going on. Sometimes Steve wishes he can be _them_ , ignorant against the magic of the world.

“Calm down, _King_ Steve, I’m not an idiot,” Hargrove remarks with a chuckle, like he can read the panic in Steve’s face.

“You are if you think that talking about that here is a good idea, Hargrove,” he shots back, keeping his voice low.

“Right,” Hargrove pulls out a gum from the pocket of his denim and pops one to his mouth. “Any reason to go to the boring pep rally when we can be in the quarry right now searching for the monster?”

“Why do you assume I want to help?”

“Didn’t the brats ask you for help?”

Steve gives him a sharp sigh. “Max told you?”

“The walls at Cherry Lane’s pretty thin,” Hargrove shrugs innocently.

“Jesus, Hargrove, invasion of privacy much.”

“Well,” he pushes himself off the locker and mock-curtsies at Steve, with that kind of cocky air he’s always using when he’s at the school. Like he already owns the corridor, even though Steve’s still there, and he’s still _King_ , come the fuck on. Steve must be imagining the easy, gentle smile that he showed him at the junkyard, because it sure is a far away image from the real Billy Hargrove: the fucking arrogant asshole who’s only there for himself. Not that Steve is better than him. “If you ever grow some balls, princess, I’ll be waiting there for you.”

With that, Hargrove leaves, all swagger, attracting attention from nearby girls who swoons at his sight.

Steve puts his fist on the metal of his locker and presses until his fingers hurt. He decides he fucking _hates_ that blond asshole, but that still doesn’t prevent him from skipping the pep rally altogether.

He doesn’t drive to the quarry at once.

Dustin is waiting for him at the entrance of the school when he drives by, Lucas and Max beside him with frowns on their faces. He doesn’t wait for them to say anything. He only stops in front of them, unlocks the car, and gestures at them to get in. A heavy air of nervousness hangs around them as he focuses, scowling at the road as he presses on the gas, driving them away from the school to the quarry.

“We need to find Will quickly before the monster finds him.”

“Didn’t Jonathan and Nancy got lost in the woods too?”

“How can they get lost in the woods? We _never_ got lost.”

“Hey, hey, _hey_ ,” Steve cuts into their conversation, feeling another headache coming as he’s forced to listen to them arguing, despite the aspirin he consumed. “Why am I stuck with the three of you? Where is El and that little shit?”

“Mike went to get her,” Lucas answers.

“Well, where is she? You all know she’s the only one that’s worth something when it comes to fighting those things.”

“She was with Hopper...”

“Did you squirts get _caught_ by the chief of police?”

“We _didn’t_ , she insisted to help with the search, she told us the woods was being weird or something, said that she’s the only way people don’t get lost even further,” Max huffs the answer in annoyance, as if Steve’s supposed to _know_ these things already, as if he has one of their walkie-talkies stashed on his house, eavesdropping. He’s not Hargrove, Christ’s sake. “Hopper just thinks she’s Will’s cousin.”

“So, you _all_ are lying to the chief of police.”

“No, Mrs. Byers is.”

“Joyce Byers _knows_ about the forest being magic?” Steve rolls the steering wheel under his hand as he makes a sharp turn, sending Lucas’ body to press against Max, pushing her against the door. He watches as Max pushes him harshly away with a slight blush in her freckled cheeks.

“Harrington, can’t you _drive_?!” Max yells loudly.

The way she pronounces his name reminds him that there’s somebody waiting for him at the quarry. “Yes,” he deadpans. He sends her a sharp glare from the mirror. “Why aren’t you with your brother?”

“ _Step_ brother,” Max corrects stubbornly, “and what does that asshole have to do with this?”

“He’s waiting at the quarry right now.”

“Why the fuck is he at the quarry right now, Harrington?”

“Max, he _knows_ about this.”

“How the fuck does that psycho knows about this?” Dustin yells from the passenger seat, holding on to the seatbelt tight enough to make his knuckles go white.

Steve quietens as the car jumps against a bumpy road. “I told him,” he mutters. “But he already knows there are monsters in the woods, okay?” Not that it’s anyone fucking business, since Steve’s the one who created it at the first place, he can tell anyone, everyone if he wants. “I just don’t think it’s safe for him, he’s already off searching by himself, he’ll get himself killed like that.”

“Get himself ‘killed’? Have you _met_ him?” Lucas retorts. His voice is pointed, and he’s holding on to the handle at the back just to keep his body from bumping against Max once more.

“Yeah, Steve, you dingus, have _you_ met him?” Dustin eggs on.

Steve presses against the brake, sending dry soil everywhere as his car grounds to a halt. They’re parked near the quarry, and not a few meters away, he sees the Camaro first before he sees the owner, sitting over the hood with a small smirk on his face, smoking peacefully, watching them with undisturbed expression, like he’s expecting them.

Fuck Billy Hargrove for having enough faith to know that Steve is coming.

“Oh, you brought the brats,” Hargrove remarks as they step off of Steve’s Beemer. “Almost thought that it’s just going to be the two of us against the world.”

“Yeah, keep dreaming, Hargrove,” Steve replies as he slams the trunk closed, his nail-bat in hand, too harsh, the sound ringing in the air.

The smirk on Hargrove’s lips widens, like he’s laughing at a joke that no one seems to get but himself. “Oh, wouldn’t you like me to,” he says as he pushes himself off his hood, taking off his jacket in the process. Steve’s too busy wondering _what the fuck does that mean_ when he sees the crowbar in Hargrove’s hand. When he rolls the steel inside his palm, Hargrove’s muscle flexes against the black shirt, a slight sheen of sweat on the tanned skin.

He doesn’t want to admit it, but he’s a little _glad_ that Hargrove’s on their team.

“Hey, Billy,” Max greets darkly, settling between Lucas and Hargrove. She actually looks like she could take her brother on, considering he’s twice her size, Steve can’t help but to be impressed.

Hargrove gives his sister a sideway glance. “Hey, shitbird. Where’s your friend?”

“She’s coming,” the frown on Max’s face is fierce. Steve can practically senses that there’s something unsaid from the way they’re conversing, a language only the siblings understand.

“He knows El?” He hears Dustin mutter.

Max doesn’t answer. They’re all forced to watch as the two keeps each other between a death stare, until Lucas decides to open his mouth and says (and again, if he’s a little older, Steve would _love_ to be Lucas’ friend, really), “Can you fight another time when Will is safe? I would find this _amusing_ at normal occurences, but right now Will’s our priority, and we don’t even know where he is, if he’s lost in the woods or kidnapped by monsters or _something_.”

Hargrove raises his brow at Lucas, almost impressed. “He’s not in the woods.” Steve wonders what happened between them.

“How would _you_ know?” Dustin half-yells.

“Well, you can trust my words or wait for that girl to tell you the same thing, but you'll be wasting your time,” Hargrove gives him a non-commital shrug. He glances back at the lines of trees behind him. The sun is starting to set, making the sky blush orange and pink. Steve feels a train of familiarity hitting him. “But that Byers kid is not in the woods.”

“Luke...” Max puts her hand against Lucas’ shoulder. “Just... you can trust him on that.”

“What do you mean?”

“Billy is not exactly _normal_.”

“What does _that_ mean?”

Hargrove glances back at his sister coldly, his eyes warning her not to talk further. Steve watches the exchange with his mind racing, but his eyes are focused to Hargrove, the way the light of dusk fall onto his hair, the way he’s facing the woods, his body alert, _waiting_.

Before he can find his voice, Hargrove tightens his grip against the crow bar and turns to the quarry, when something emerges from the water, feathers dark against the sky.

El arrives on the back of Mike’s bike, almost too late, during which Lucas heroically saves Dustin from having his hand eaten by the big bird. The creature _seems_ like what was in Steve’s dream, except it doesn’t smell like flowers anymore. If anything, it smells like rotting and something chemical, like standing in the middle of the janitor closet for too long.

She holds her hand on the air and binds the bird with her magic, not even stepping down from the bike, sending it crashing against the ground. Steve _knows_ what to do, and almost doesn’t even see Billy as he smashes the head, feeling the nails push against the black flesh.

But Billy’s there, the crowbar mashing the flesh, his blue eyes bright. He almost seems excited by the display, anger flaring through his muscles as he _swings_ to the glassy eye of the bird, sending black goo everywhere.

Billy is a fucking maniac.

It takes Steve’s breath away, how they’re working in unison, until the bird stops moving, until the wings lay limply on the ground.

When he pulls away, their clothes are stained by the liquid. They both catch their breath, staring at each other, their hair flat from the sweat. The smell is fucking horrible, but Steve doesn’t mind it, feels the world closing around them until his eyes can only focus on Billy, the way he flexes his neck with amusement blooming on his face.

“Feel that, King Steve?” he goads, laughter in his words, and he looks ridiculous; the bird clawed him and missed during the battle, but blood is trickling from a cut on his brow, dripping down to the side of his eye, mixing with the black goo that has spattered against his face. “You, me, against the monsters.”

“You two are fucking _insane_ ,” he hears Max say, and Steve almost laughs, because he _feels_ like he’s crazy, but for the first time for a while, he knows he’s not alone, because he sees a mirror across of him.

“They’re _awesome_ , actually,” Dustin replies airily.

Steve’s eyes are still fixed on Billy. Even beneath all the dirt and goo he still looks like a marble. “There is no ‘you and me’, Billy,” Steve says without thinking, fails from preventing himself from saying it.

Billy doesn’t seem to notice it. He raises his brow before turning away, walking to his Camaro, dropping the conversation so quick that Steve can’t stop the feeling of his stomach sinking.

He feels _disappointed_ , but he can’t put his fingers around why.

Shoving the feelings far into his mind, he decides to turn his attention to El, who only now steps away now from Mike’s bike. His breath is still heavy on his throat as he stares at her. Mike frowns, but backs down when El puts her hand on his shoulder. It’s funny, really, how he’s protecting her, when they all know she’s stronger than all of them combined.

“We need to talk,” he repeats the sentence he told to her before.

“It’s not over,” she says, and Steve _knows_ that, really, but he’s desperate for answers.

“Look, El—“

“There is a monster inside the water, Steve. It’s always been here, but someone’s magic is feeding it, and it’s corrupting the woods.” El starts. Steve is surprised, really, by the smoothness of her words, considering she’s never talked that long before. She seems more solid, he realizes, when she’s standing near the woods; the view of her inside Hawkins seems transparent, like her body’s yelling about how she doesn’t belong. “It wants the powers of the forest. It wants the forest to die, so it can control the magic from the earth.”

“Who brought it here?” he asks.

“An outsider,” she replies solemnly. She glances at Max, who Steve doesn’t realize has been listening, with her nails digging her arm, frowning. “Will... Will is still alive. I don’t feel his spirit returning yet... but the outsider has taken him under. I can’t reach him to make sure he’s okay. The monster grows stronger, Greywaren. It’s in the water, but it has been building, eating, and it wants me so it can own the forest. And I can _help_ , really. I’m strong. But if it has me, it will have the forest.”

“The water?” He asks, his brain racing to understand.

“The body of the monster lives inside the quarry,” someone behind him adds.

Steve hates how much of that voice already sounds so familiar to him, that he doesn’t have to turn to know who he is.

Before he can turn, though, the lightbulb in his brain _lights up_.

The monsters he’s been killing, the bird, the purple light of the raven inside the dog-creature’s mouth, the corpses he disposed into the water, have been coming back, their bodies combined with each other. He dreamt about the dog creature inside the water, dreamt about always being at the edge of the quarry and the forest crawling behind him, preventing him from doing so.

He’s always been scared at the forest because it chases him to the edge. Because he wants to run and _fall_ to the dark water. But the forest always shows him what’s in it, the stark white wood, the creatures, and the water is always murky, reflecting the nature around it instead of showing its form.

Darkness settles against him as he realizes he’s been feeding his dream creatures into the belly of the monster.

He flinches, his arm around his body, can feel himself _shivering_. El’s gaze on him is knowing, full of sympathy, but Steve doesn’t deserve it, really. He turns away from it and finds Billy staring at him, almost gentle, almost like Billy in his dreams. The gaze that in his dreams feel comforting. But it doesn’t feel comforting here. It makes him feel sick of himself.

“Steve.” Billy reaches for his arm.

Steve steps away. “ _Don’t_ even fucking think about it, Hargrove.” And Steve knows that he’s not the Billy in his dreams, but he wishes he is, so he could feel safe, even just for a moment, and he feels sick, because the dream has been born out of _selfishness_ , just another creature out of his invention that he creates because he just feels fucking _lonely_ and _sad_.

He doesn’t want to deal with this. He just wants to run.

He avoids the gaze on his skin, doesn’t even hear everyone’s voices as he darts to his car and fucking _leaves_. The Beemer struggles against the soft soil under it before it finally fucking runs, dragging him away from the pointed stares that he could feel on his skin.

Steve wants to sleep right now.

He wants the safety the dreams have been giving him.

His house watches him in complete silence as he blasts open the door to his parents’ bedroom. Steve never comes inside when his parents are not around, more out of habit than fear. It’s always been a forbidden door he can’t enter, although the door is always unlocked and he’s been everywhere in the house, racking up the wine cellar until it’s messy and going through the liquor cabinet in the basement until most of it is opened, but the bedroom has always been _off limits_.

Dust lays in every surface even though the furniture seems brand new, giving off a feeling of an open house, of it being _unlived_ , and Steve almost laughs, really, because there isn’t even any pretending in his parents’ part anymore. None of their things are here, only the uniform furniture that seems to fill the house. A caricature of a perfect house. He realizes that it’s been a long time since he saw them sleeping here. They’ve always come one morning and left the same night.

He storms into the bathroom and opens the hidden cabinet on the back of the mirror. Almost sighs in relief to see that there’s still lines of pills that adorned the shelf, like his mother had told him. Anti-anxiety pills, birth control, hangover pills, the row full until he sees the sleeping pills that his mother shown him once upon a time, when he had a terrible insomnia and shown up in their door late at night.

_Just one pills and you’ll be okay, alright Stevie?_

His father raged when he found out. He could still recall the yelling that traveled around the house. The bruise on his mother’s cheek, rosy and angry.

_Have you any idea how fucking dangerous that was? He’s a Greywaren, and a fucking child! He doesn’t even have control of his powers! He can bring back anything!_

He takes the whole bottle and goes to his room. Swallows two, lays down, and fucking _waits_. Waits until sleep crashes into him, because he needs it, and he wants to fucking sleep, for once.

The dream doesn’t come from him. One moment he’s lying on his bed, then he’s sitting up, feeling his throat parched. He goes downstairs and pours himself a glass of water. The water turns dark when it hits the bottom of the glass. He gasps and flinches back, his back hitting something. He guesses that it’s the kitchen isle, but it feels soft, warm, _human_.

“Watch out, pretty boy.”

Oh. It is a dream.

The voice is low and soft against his ear. Unlike the surprise that comes from the real counterpart, he leans to the warmth, sighing as he feels Billy’s strong arms holding him up. He tells himself that it’s okay to feel like that, because it’s a fucking dream, and he’s happy to do as he fucking pleases.

“Why aren’t we in the forest?” he finds himself asking. He knows he’s supposed to be asleep, now, but he still feels exhaustion hanging stubbornly in his bones.

“You ran, remember?” Billy pushes him away, not harsh enough to make him stumble, but enough to keep him away. The form of Billy Hargrove seems so strange in his kitchen, like he doesn’t belong here, but Steve’s glad someone’s here, even if it’s not real. “If I meet you in the forest, you’ll probably just run again, like you always do.”

“I don’t _always_ run.”

Amusement flashes on Billy’s face. “You ran this time,” he crowds against Steve, pushing him against the marble of his kitchen. Feels the surface cold against his skin, again, _too fucking real_. “Why? Because you can’t deal with the fact that the entity is strong because of your doing?”

Steve jaw tenses.

“Because you fear you’re not strong enough?”

And he’s right. Steve’s always running, because he’s afraid, because he’s selfish.

“Then?” Billy asks, and Steve should nail it against his brain, by now, the fact that dream Billy knows the dark parts of his mind, that he’s exposed and vulnerable, and he wishes it’s violating instead of freeing, liberating, the feeling of being known. It feels safe, and that’s fucking _strange_.

“You wouldn’t understand,” he mutters. His voice is shaking, his entire body feels like an earthquake that is incapable to stop. Even his legs feel weak under him. He shouldn’t feel like that, but he’s never in control, even in his own dreams, and it angers him. “Don’t get too close or I’ll wake myself up, Billy.”

“You can’t,” Billy chuckles. “Sleeping pills, remember? You can’t wake up even if you want to, you’re stuck here with me.”

Yeah, he remembers, because he’s an impulsive idiot.

“Why did you do that, anyway?” Billy doesn’t move from him, his hands leaning on the marble, preventing Steve from moving away. His breath feels warm against Steve’s cheek. The brand-new scar in his brow is already healed into a pale skin, a break on his usually bushy dark brow. “You already know you’re stuck in a dream if you take sleeping pills, Steve. You can’t run now.”

“Maybe I don’t want to wake up.”

A laugh. “That’s pretty fuckin’ morbid.”

“Maybe,” and his words got stuck in his throat before he forces it out, “I want to stay here, with you.”

Something dark streams in Billy’s eyes, like a warning. Dangerous. It makes Steve wants to run away, but he plants his feet and stares back at the way those bright blue eyes shine even in the darkness. “I told you to not say those things,” his voice is rough and low, almost a growl. “If you keep that up, I might not let you wake up, this time. Do you really crave death that much, Harrington? Because let me tell you. It hurts to die.”

"This is a dream," he replies. "How bad can it be?"

Billy laughs. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

Billy leans into Steve’s neck, and takes a _bite_. His teeth pressing against his pulse, pleasure and pain, mingling. Steve feels his blood, ice in his veins.

Because it _hurts_.

The world shakes under him, or he is the one shaking, and right now he’s not so sure.

Suddenly finding his strength, he raises his arms and shoves Billy away. He finds that easy smile on Billy’s lips, except he knows now that there’s no Billy in the dream. It’s just Hargrove. This is just the real living boy that's somehow now plaguing his dreams. Hargrove’s gaze on him feels cold, amusement and disappointment dripping from his stare.

“You’re _real_ ,” Steve finds himself saying. Doesn’t even realize he’s talking until it’s out of his mouth, spilling out, anger full in his chest. “You’re not... I didn’t imagine, I didn’t create you—you’re fucking _real_.”

Billy’s laughter is low and wild. Steve feels like he’s crashing. He remarks, once, how Billy laughs like it’s a threat, _you laugh with me or I laugh at you_. It’s the way he is, a betrayal against every gentle, soft, Billy in his dreams, that accompany him throughout the cold nights, calming him down, protecting him away from the creatures, the night terrors. They can't be the same person. It's just simply not possible. Maybe he's only here now, for the first time. But why? That doesn't make _sense,_ because he is exactly the same Billy that has been beside him.

“I’ve always been fuckin’ real,” Billy says between his laughs. “You’re just the fucking dumbass who can’t differentiate dreams from reality, Steve. I’ve always been the same person, unlike you.”

“How are you here in my dreams?” he asks, putting distance between them. He remembers El saying that she can’t even touch dreams, and she’s been powerful. “Are you _Greywaren_?”

“You would understand this quicker if you hadn’t run away earlier,” Billy scoffs. He rubs the bridge of his nose and leans against the kitchen isle. “And nope, not a Greywaren.”

Steve glances all around the kitchen. His house feels too real. The things are in the same place as the real world, making him tremble. He sees the knives in its wooden block and feels fear. What if _this_ is reality? What if, if he tries to slit his arm to wake up he’s going to die for real? When Billy bit him, earlier, it had hurt. What if it hurts when he hurts himself?

It doesn’t sound _so_ bad, if he’s being honest, he can finally not deal with all of this.

“Jesus, you are fucking messed up, aren’t you?”

“Get out of my head!” Steve snaps. He keeps forgetting that for some reason.

“I told you, it’s not like I _want_ to read your mind. It’s just that your subconscious is connected to the woods, and I’m connected to the woods, so I just fucking _know_ what you’re thinking about, alright? Why are you freaking out now? I’ve been here for days, Steve. I know what you want. I know how much you want to run from the real world. I know how much you want to stay here with _me_.”

Steve glares. His hand darts for the knives and pulls out the biggest one, points it against Billy’s chest. “I might not be able to hurt myself so that I wake up, but what if I could hurt you? I can create anything from my dream to reality. I can kill you right here, and who knows, maybe you’ll find yourself bleeding to death when you wake up.”

“Are you for fuckin’ real right now?”

“I’m serious, Billy.”

Billy’s brow raises. Steve thinks that he’ll be angry, but he’s surprised when Billy laughs, except now it’s all amusement, ringing against the silence of the house. His thick fingers wrap against the steel, pushing it away, hard enough to open a cut in his palm, making him bleed.

The knife clatters loudly against the floor as Billy pushes back into his space. His hand is bleeding. It drips to the floor, wet against Steve’s bare feet.

“You know, Steve Harrington,” their lips are close, together, and Steve’s falls open, not thinking. He can taste the cigarette and menthol on the air. “Of all the fuckin’ people in Hawkins, I’m glad it’s you, because Jesus Christ, you’re not fucking _boring_.”

The kiss is right there, just at the edge, but he’s still surprised when Billy finally kisses him, tongue exploring his mouth, the heat and the warmth feeling like it’s heating up his insides. He gives into the kiss, just to feel more of the warmth. Billy’s hand darts to his cheek, holding him there, and he could feel the blood, the taste of it in his tongue.

The shaking inside him stops. It feels safe.

He must have gone fucking _insane_.

It also feels like forever—dream logic not needing breath, of course. When Billy pulls away, there’s fire behind his eyes, burning, and Steve can feel the same thing inside him, the kind of need that feels like it’s swallowing him whole.

“Told you,” he’s still close, hands on Steve’s arm, holding him up. “You, me, against the world?”

Steve chuckles, despite everything. It bursts out of him until he’s laughing. Doesn’t even know why. He feels _whole_ , for a moment. He’s not alone. There’s people in the real world beside him, Tommy and Carol and Nancy and Dustin and the other brats, but he’s always been alone in the dreams, except now, someone is with him. For a moment, he’s not lonely. _Billy_ ’s with him, and he’s been for so many nights now.

“There’s never going to be you and me,” Steve says, but it’s weak. Unsure. Open.

“Watch it. I still _can_ force you to stay here forever. I have the powers, pretty boy.”

“Are you going to?” he asks, but somehow it sounds like a request.

The smile that flashes in his lips are sad. His gaze is far away, remembering something. “No,” he mutters. “People should always be free to leave, especially when they don’t want to stay anymore.”

But, like the first dream, when he realized he wanted to stay, Steve does wish, against his common sense, that he wants to stay forever.

And he also knows that Billy knows that.

Something crashes upstairs. The sound of glass shattering. Billy looks at him, the fire in his eyes replaced by sadness. “Time’s up,” he says, “You shouldn’t have taken those sleeping pills, Steve.”

Steve squints, confused. “ _Billy_?”

A darkness falls from the stairs, slowly, dripping to the floor until it pools, covering the tiles. Steve feels like the entire world is frozen. It’s water, he realizes. Except it’s _not_. It’s turns into the form of a gray-haired man, gray suit, the only color in him is the black tie around his neck. He looks like a normal man—the kind of man that runs a business, the kind of important person that works with his father, except everything on him is gray, even his skin.

 _GREYWAREN_ , he calls. _THANK YOU FOR THE FLESH. SACRIFICE. FEED. TURNING ME STRONG._

Steve wants to say something, except it’s stuck in his throat. Billy stands between him and the entity, the monster in the quarry, the one he’s—the one his family has been feeding into for so long, keeping it sated, keeping it alive. He ran earlier because he knew it wasn’t just him. His father was the one who _told_ him to throw the creatures to the quarry. His father knows about the monster.

 _VESSEL_ , the entity talks, his voice coming from everywhere, filling the room easily. _YOU’RE THE ONE MY DAUGHTER CHOSE? YOU’RE HIS SON. I TOLD YOU I WILL FIND YOU_.

“Steve,” Billy says, not turning away from the entity. “If you can wake up, right now, you should, before it's too late.”

“Billy, I need you to understand. This is my fault...”

Billy has made his dreams feel safe. Steve drank the sleeping pills because he wanted to feel that comfort, longer, run away from the harsh stare at his skin, the fact he’s fucked up. He doesn’t _know_ that the entity can be here. But maybe he should’ve known, really. Monsters have a way of showing up inside his dreams, and the quarry has always been there from the start.

 _HE CAN’T WAKE UP. YOU KNOW THAT_.

His father had left him here. His parents took away all their things and left only the pills because they _know_. They lie, again and again and again and left him alone here, to deal with this himself.

“Steve. Please. _Wake up_.”

Steve almost laughs. Can only watch as Billy tries to push him away as the entity moves. The darkness swallows them whole, storming into his mouth, cold and wet against his flesh.

And well, he knows what’s happening, now, what he's forced to do. He _understands_.

Steve Harrington wakes up in his bed.

He feels earthquake under his skin.

Someone is standing on his door, the body small and thin, her curls brown and close to her ears, and he wishes it’s not forgiveness in her eyes, but it is.

“El,” he says. He can still taste the cigarette in his tongue even beneath the bile of panic that chokes him. It grounds him. He doesn’t know if the wetness on his cheeks are from Billy’s blood, the entity, or his tears. “I’m _sorry_. I’m sorry. I fucked up. I’m too much of an idiot. I brought it to reality. I _created_ it. My family... it kept it alive, all this time.”

El stares at him and frowns. “It’s okay. Bad Papa. We can fix. We can fight. You are not alone. We are not alone.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The updates might be rushed, but I really just need this out of my head before the muse runs out. Expect the last chapter of this on Sunday? Or maybe sooner. idek.
> 
> I don't plan this instalment to be the last of this, btw.

**Author's Note:**

> Yell on me on [tumblr](http://willemsragnarsson.tumblr.com/) or something.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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